Terrorist Link to Copyright Piracy Alleged 731
xbsd writes "John Stedman, a lieutenant in the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department in charge of IP violations, testified in front of the Senate Homeland Security committee that some associates of terrorist groups such as Hezbollah may be involved in copyright violations. According to CNET's Declean McCullagh: 'Even though Stedman's evidence is circumstantial, his testimony comes as Congress is expected to consider new copyright legislation this year. An invocation of terrorism, the trump card of modern American politics, could ease the passage of the next major expansion of copyright powers'."
Is it just me or... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Is it just me or... (Score:4, Insightful)
Well (Score:5, Insightful)
Hell lets just call Nazis terrorists now. They are pretty much interchangable if you ignore the "short" gap between the end of the second world war and today
Unless you're a cuban terrorist... (Score:4, Interesting)
Jolyon
Re:Well (Score:5, Insightful)
If piracy was a political problem 20 years ago they would have called them "commies".
Re:Well (Score:3, Insightful)
Maybe we could even slap the label onto the US government, since they seem to be doing such a good job of scaring their population.
BTW did you notice that the Lucas got the Sith Lord in third episode of Star Wars saying something similar to Bush's "you are either for us or against us". I'll let you draw your o
Counterfeiting is actually a real problem ... (Score:3, Insightful)
True, but counterfeiting (money, CDs, DVDs, designer labels, etc.) is popular with terrorists, its a source of income. Don't let your knee jerk reaction cause you to miss that detail. THings are more complicated than you suggest.
Re:Well (Score:3, Informative)
The fire-bombing of Dresden.
In related news... (Score:5, Interesting)
<SARCASM>
So people who drive too fast obviously have terrorist connections. They should be punished as terrorists.
</SARCASM>
Re:In related news... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:In related news... (Score:5, Funny)
Terrorist have been know to use communication devices, like video taped messages played over the television, phones, radios, and even the internet. Everyone that broadcast television, uses a phone, has a CB radio, or connects to the internet is likely a terrorist and should be stopped.
Terrorist have been known to use guns. Most police have guns. We should lock up all of the police officers.
Terrorist have been known to speak a foreign language. French people speak a foreign language. We must invade before they get a chance to surrender.
Terrorist have been known to have dark skin. People who visit beaches seem to have darker skin. We should get rid of Miami. They didn't speak english down there anyway.
I don't know what's worse, the fact that someone would suggest this, or the fact that our representatives in congress might believe this (or at least use it as an excuse to push some corporate funded law).
If terrorists copywrited their documents... (Score:2)
-b
Hezbollah funding (Score:2, Insightful)
Prior Art (Score:4, Insightful)
And just like The War on Drugs it is a farce that ignores the realities of the world we live in in favor of making money on an outdated status quo.
Re:Prior Art (Score:3, Insightful)
Back on topic, hmm, lets think about this. People that are wiling to kill a number of people including themselves would never seem to be people to violate copyright violations. WTF? Granted I didn't read the FA, but I read recently where some of the knockoff street vendors in cities are fronts for terrorist funding. That too shocked me. I always thought those street vend
Re:Prior Art (Score:3, Interesting)
Social and Economic conservatives tout their mythological Free Market, and how the Free Market is beneficial for the consumer. Bbut when it comes to the War on Drugs, they've created the most lopsided market, and one that operates at such incedibly inflated prices, precisely because of their attempts to restrict it.
Marijuana, which can grow practically anywhere, sells for
Not P2P (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Not P2P (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Not P2P (Score:2, Insightful)
Unfortunately (Score:3, Insightful)
I mean think: If they were really concerned about loss of money, their major campaign would be against the vendors that sell counterfit goods, not the end users. There hasn't been much research done on P2P, but the one empirical study that has been done by Harvard and UNC showed that P2P has no stasticaly significant affect on music sales. So one would think they'd
Fighting piracy helps terrorism!! (Score:5, Interesting)
If the **AA spends wipes out common piracy, people won't be getting their free movies through BT, Kazaa or whatever. By the laws of human desire, the next cheapest way to get this content would be the knockoff DVDs right? Won't kicking people off of common piracy just make professional piracy more profitable?
Therefore fighting piracy funds terrorism.
Re:Not P2P (Score:4, Insightful)
Some of these operations include selling pirated DVD's on the street corner.
Re:Not P2P (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Not P2P (Score:5, Insightful)
It's laughable to bother with IP violations as sources of terrorist fuding, compared to the billions of extra dollars pouring into the region due to high oil prices. The idea that the Saudis will go broke and quit supporting terrorism, if only we can get them to pay $13 for their DVDs like everybody else, is so utterly ridiculous that it's almost impossible to refute without resorting to sarcasm. The whole region runs on oil proceeds.
I'm interested to hear why you think the legality of oil sales has any bearing on the potency of the money generated for funding terrorism.
Finally, I question the importance of funding to terrorist operations in the first place. Sure, they need a little money to operate - enough to buy a few boxcutters and a dozen plane tickets. But when a few thousand dollars of terrorist funds can provoke hundreds of billions of dollars in response, something has got to give. We'll never de-fund them enough to win with that ratio.
Especially since the oil windfall has the whole region swimming in money right now.
Re:Not P2P (Score:3, Insightful)
It requires different solutions. In the context of this article by the police Lt., he is concerned with the counterfeit goods being sold and that money being funneled to [whomever]. There is nothing he personally can do about Middle East government money being funneled to terrorists. He can, however, arrest people selling counterfeit goods.
But if your argument is that the terrorist revenue from black market DVDs sold on street corners is even close t
I'm sorry... (Score:2)
Oh, and hey, news flash: copy protection and crap like that won't stop any organization large enough to fund terrorists... it'll screw the home user, but your money is still going to be just as fucking stolen. G'day.
if only (Score:5, Funny)
Now, if only we could catch Al Qaeda's Osama Bin Laden in violation of copyright laws! Then he'd have to deal with the RIAA and the MPAA.... heaven help him!
because lawyers can find *anyone* ;) (Score:3, Funny)
Attn: Mr. Sheik Osama Bin Laden
Dear Sir,
Your IP address 259.0.0.1 has been detected sharing on the 'Pear To Pear' program by the name of 'e-Jihad', the following files which have been determined by our trained human staff to be copyrighted works or material by music and motion picture artists:
Re:if only (Score:3, Informative)
What!? (Score:4, Interesting)
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
And so this is how a tyranny is born..... (Score:3, Insightful)
Big surprise (Score:4, Insightful)
The article itself points out that they benefit from a range of different criminal activities. Further limiting domestic rights to fight foreign troublemakers doesn't seem to work.
What? (Score:2)
From TFA: "Hezbollah depends on a wide variety of criminal enterprises, ranging from smuggling to fraud to drug trade to diamond trade in regions across the world, including North America, South America and the Middle East, to raise money."
Simple: If it's copyright holders worried about this, they've got bigger and far, far easier fish to fry (i.e. college students).
Just wait... (Score:4, Insightful)
You might call this a troll post, but seriously guys (and gals), doesn't anyone in the US Government think rationally anymore? Or is that also somehow an act of terrorism? Sheesh.
sooner or later (Score:2)
No wonder, of course organizations which use killing in an attempt to overtrow a rule to their favour will have no problem breaching copyright laws.
Even though laws should be restricted given this remarcable discovery, they might learn that they probably won't stop copying whatever they want, and nor will they stop killing.
But now the all copyright violaters are sided next to terrorists.
Of course.. Blue is blue.
Didn't you know it would come to this? (Score:5, Funny)
with apologies to
Thomas De Quincey
War for freedom (NOT) (Score:2)
Don't get me wrong, there was the civil war, which also dealt with issues of freedom, but a win for either side would result in a loss of freedom somewhere (north wins: states loose freedom, south wins: black people loose freedom)
Problem is, the U.S. is already turning the war to perserve freedom into a grab for powe
Of course. (Score:2)
Wow. (Score:2)
*gasp*
I'd bet very good money that some associates of major Christian religions may be involved in copyright violations, too, but that alone proves NOTHING about the evilness or wrongness of it.
Propaganda seems to work best when you leave the illogical conclusions unstated. That way the consumers of the propaganda wonder what the point was, and, assuming there is a point, try to fill in the blanks on their ow
Straight from an internal Hezbollah email (Score:5, Funny)
Source of funding (Score:2)
Did his task force catch some pretty large organizations? Evidently so.
Links to 'terrorism'? Tenuous at best, and then only as a funding source by 'sympathizers'. Much as the IRA was/is funded in part by 'sympathizers' in Boston.
Do these clowns need to be busted? Yes, of course. Flying to Lebanon with
disgusting (Score:2)
Now, how many non-copyright infringers are involved in terrorism?
Saying that copyright infringement is linked to terrorism is like saying breathing is linked to terrorism. Gee! Figure that one out. All terrorists breathe! That must be it!
Copyright infringment doesn't cause or support terrorism - it's just trendy.
Forced secession time (Score:2)
Reason #6079870946321098708465498708407 why California should not be allowed to be a US state.
If piracy is outlawed.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:If piracy is outlawed.... (Score:3, Insightful)
As soon as someone starts a sentance with "we must stop piracy" and they are talking about file copying and have a vested interest in it, they are frothing at the mouth too much to be consider as sane.
It's the same deal with "cyber-terrorism", don't see a lot of self aware robots with bombs around.
Terrorist link to MPAA, RIAA, and BSA alleged (Score:3, Interesting)
Do they use strong arm bullying tactics, and threats to get their way. Well
Do they hate people who love freedom. Well
Do they they try to controll society by fear instead of facts. Well
They must be talking about themselves.
PS: Lets not use "their" terms. Piracy is where you board a ship and murder people, I think the appropiate term is information liberators.
Re:Terrorist link to MPAA, RIAA, and BSA alleged (Score:3, Informative)
Call it "liberation" all you want, you are still violating intellectual property. Are IP laws perfect? No. But they do have a legitimate reason to exist.
Well, call it property all you want, but it's still has nothing to do with property rights and everthing to do with controll. Are copy monopoly laws perfect, no they're like the old soviet era whose time has passed.
Everybody in the world is not obligated to distribute their work for free to anyone who wants it. Sorry.
Ahem. No one ever said the
In related news... (Score:3, Insightful)
Even though my evidence is circumstantial, nay... entirely nonexistant, my testimony comes as Congress is not expected to consider new congressional ethics legislation this year. An invocation of child abuse, the trump card of modern American politics, could ease the passage of the next major restriction of congressional powers.
-
Want something outlawed?? (Score:4, Funny)
Random manager: "I know how to sway Congress, just tell them terrorists are using open source software, and they'll outlaw it in no time."
Bill: "Do they? Use open source, that is??"
Random manager: "I haven't met any terrorists, so I wouldn't know. The point is, they could."
Bill: "Good point."
I do note one thing... (Score:3, Insightful)
I just wanted to point that out before a lot of anti-Bush crud started up yet again. Just remember Clinton and his cronies were no different, really. Political correctness, their own version of terrorists in the form of "right-wing hate groups", more political correctness...
I'll say it again, whoever wins, we lose. Next elections, we need to be looking to wipe out both Republicans and Democrats at the polls. Trouble is, the third parties out there are either left of Stalin, loopy wingnuts like Perot, or worse altogether than that. Sadly, the common public doesn't seem to have much interest in a party with a rights, privacy, and constitutionalist bent. In short, the only people truly belonging in government are those who really don't want to serve in their heart of hearts and the people are prone to electing whoever grubs and scrounges for it the hardest.
So I don't expect these copyright issues to change, I don't expect the undue influence of major corporations or noisy political groups to lessen. I really don't. Sadly... So now we have another reason to infringe on the civil rights of our people. Did we really need another reason? Did they need one? Do they ever?
The Corporatism Here.... (Score:5, Interesting)
... is getting in my nerves. Why should the big corporations here have the right to meddle into our copyright laws, and then slap the name "terrorism" in the justification of doing so? The problem with these copyright laws that the MPAA/RIAA have been pushing is that they are forgetting our (the citizen's) end of the stick. They have been increasing the duration of copyrights and patents to the point that most of us would be dead before we see Mickey Mouse in the public domain (since they keep extending it). They have been increasing the punishments for people who have already been illegally copyright infringing (since when does uploading a movie to the Internet warrant a 3-year prison sentence?), and illegalizing things that should be under fair-use (e.g., the DMCA; why should the government tell me what to do with my DVDs in my own private use?). The politicians are ignorant about technical issues, the voters are ignorant about the politicians, and they're letting the corporations run amok. But where is our public domain? Where is our "fair use"? Where is our freedom?
It's like our government is being run by the Socialist Party and the Fascist Party. Both of them don't care about liberty and both don't want a small government. All they want to do is to continue manipulating the public until they reach their logical goals: a huge, authoritarian government. The only difference is that the socialists would justify it in the name of "helping the poor" and the fascists would justify it in the name of "moral values." Both would justify it in the names of "protecting the children" and "defending this country against terrorism."
Come on Libertarians and Greens. They will have to win the 2008 election if we ever hope for this country to be saved by this rampant corporatism and the move toward totalitarianism.
It's the War on Freedom (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:The Corporatism Here.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe the socialists actually believe, or want to believe, that; but it's simply not true. One of my essential rights is the right to maintain my property and the fruits and rewards of my labor. Socialists do not recognize that principle and believe that it's OK for "society" to take from individuals and redistribute wealth and resources in the name of "fairness" and equality. But no matter what the justification, if my property is stolen from me, it's still stolen. Just naming the thief "government" and calling it "taxation" instead of "robbery" doesn't change anything.
Anyway, all of that aside, rampant socialism just does not work anyway. Look at the former USSR... "from each according to his means, to each according to his need" or whatever, makes a nice sound bite. But in practice this means that the government leader types were "more equal" than the common folks because they had... wait for it.... power. After all, somebody had to be "in charge" to make sure the wealth redistribution stuff was carried out.
But there's the rub... no matter how you justify it, no matter how you try to structure it, if you create an institution that grants certain people power or dominion over others, it will eventually become corrupt as people attempt to manipulate the system for their own benefit. Socialism sounds good on paper, but in practice it leads to totalitarianism just like fascism does.
Re:The Corporatism Here.... (Score:3, Insightful)
You think you would in a purely capitalist society, where no effort were made to stop monopolies through anti-trust laws, where the company could sack you at any time, with no regulation of work? How many of the basic utilities would you have to pay blood for because there's one provider? Oh you want sewage, pay us
Re:The Corporatism Here.... (Score:3, Interesting)
That is the question, isn't it? I think there are two ways of going about it: we can either work from within the various organizations I've listed and try to convice them to work with each other, or we can work from without by starting an entirely new organization (maybe the "Coalition for Information Freedom" or something?) and encouraging them to support it. I just wonder which approach would work better. I suspect the latter would, just because the Greens wo
zerg (Score:5, Insightful)
Before the Soviet Union collapsed, everything evil was blamed on communists, and any response, no matter how stupid, was deemed acceptible in order to fight communism. And it "worked". The Soviet Union's collapse occured after the US did all sorts of stupid things in the name of fighting communism, therefore the fall of communism *must [skepdic.com]* have been brought about by America's direct intervention!
Fighting terrorism is no different. And I quote:
Homeland Security is a bigger threat to the American way of life than anything Osama bin Forgotten can come up w/. Feel free to do something about it [aclu.org]...
Re:zerg (Score:5, Insightful)
Aha, but that is just exactly what he did: come up with it. He even stated that he wanted the american people to feel as oppressed as people of a lot of 'muslim' countries. He would like to see roadblocks, censorship, etc. in the USA, because that would cause the people to revolt and overthrow its government. It would end the idiotic foreign policies that have been a major factor in causing extremism and terrorism to flourish in the first place.
And the frightning thing is, he has with his actions succeeded to influence the US government more than any US citizen could ever do.
Think about it: one man (according to messiah-like myth forming) being able to cause the most powerful nation on earth to do what he publicly stated he wanted them to do. Pretty frightning.
Everytime you download free with bittorrent (Score:5, Funny)
Instead of hemming and hewing... (Score:3, Insightful)
Write them a letter. With an envelope. And a stamp. It carries a tremendous amount of weight (it really does). Don't use a form letter. Don't type it. Don't call them. Write a legible, clean and concise letter expressing your viewpoint. Tell them that you do not agree with the upcoming changes to copyright laws. While you're at it, tell them you don't appreciate parts of the PATRIOT act becoming legitimate law either. Tell them that the erosion of your rights in the name of fighting "terrorists" isn't something that you're willing to tolerate anymore.
Instead of whining and bitching to people who--by and large--agree with you, write to someone who can make a difference.
When you're finished with that, write your senator [senate.gov] as well.
Um... (Score:4, Informative)
real video link bad in firefox (Score:4, Informative)
http://hsgac.senate.gov/audio_video/052505video.r
The root cause (Score:3, Insightful)
Fix that fatal flaw in US government and you'll have fixed crap like this. In the long run.
It's really very simple, idiots. Most of you are programmers. You're supposed to see how decisions now influence events in the future but I dont' see anyone discussing the root cause of these things.
I don't think either democrats or republicans will do anything about finance reforms and While voting anything other than democrats will end up strengthening republicans (sherriffs of nottingham) in the PRESIDENTIAL elections.
There are still the votes for congress which are NOT winner take all. If you vote for guys like Ralph Nader for CONGRESS then your vote will put a couple of guys that are not corrupt in power. It's not the presidency but it's a start, a start on the way to finance reform. Only AFTER finance reform will you be able to get a non dem/rep president in office.
The goal is finance reform, the method is not dem/rep so vote something else for congressmen.
This is all my personal opinion, who agrees with me?
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:3)
Why the hell would a Terrorist outfit pirtae Sith? For money? Please, they can get it much easier other places.
What a bummer! (Score:4, Funny)
Flying cars, AI, Cybernetics
(Blade Runner, RoboCop, Total recall)
Instead of that what we have?
The classic case where the government became the lapdog of massive corporations and industries and the case where the government calls a terrorist anybody who don't agree with their corrupted attitude.
(Blade Runner, RoboCop, Total recall)
What a bummer!
What's next? Ill learn that coffee is people?
Re:What a bummer! (Score:3)
Yup.
The cyberpunks had it right on. We're right on track for street gangs loaded with automatic weapons, corrupt cops loaded with automatic weapons, politicians run by corporations (when haven't they been, actually?) and the only way to survive is be an expert with both a computer and automatic weapons.
The only difference is it doesn't look like the Japanese will be the ones running things here. Now it looks like it will be the Chinese and the Israelies.
I can't wait. My kind of world. No more bullshit.
Re:What a bummer! (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:5, Informative)
This has nothing to do with socialism. Socialism includes state housing, healthcare, and welfare. What you are thinking of is right wing authoritarianism, also known as facism. Please use proper terminology when trying to state a flame war over political ideology.
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course, this is a simplification, but offers a starting point. Next:
Stalin was a socialist. Hitler was a socialist.
Do you have any idea what you're talking about? The fact that "nazi" comes from "national-socialism" or that Lenin and Stalin claimed to have "embraced and extended" Marx's theories is circumstantial for the end result - everything must start somewhere. You might as well say that Napoleon was a republican, since he begun by serving the French Republic.
Now look up those definitions on your own if you don't trust these, but to spell it out for you: Hitler was the head of a fascist regime in its purest form ('extreme right wing' some would call it). Stalin was the head of an authoritarian regime whose ideology is usually known as Marxism-Leninism (or 'extreme left wing') - some people would say it was not communism, but a perverted form, while others will argue that it was indeed communism - and the logical conclusion of any attempt to follow the theoretical sequence capitalism -> socialism -> communism to its end.
To go back to the original point, in practice there is not a whole lot of difference in form between the two extremes, but you have to bear in mind that socialism means state ownership and in the extreme (communist) case no private property, while fascism means state control, which is a little less. Also, in theory socialism does not advocate an authoritarian government, but it can easily fall into one when pushed. Now, what we have here is neither
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:5, Informative)
Joe Stalin was dictator and he got his education in Tiflis Theological Seminary. Stalin used communist party to get into power and then killed all hard line commie competitors like Leon Trotsky during Great Purge. After that the proper name of his rule was Stalinism
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:4, Insightful)
A party name doesn't mean a lot. There wasn't much in common between the USSR Communist Party and the Italian Communist Party for example. And remember that Vicente Fox's party in Mexico is the Partido Revolucionario Institucional, the Institutional Revolutionary Party, proving that a party can live with about any name, even such a fantastic one.
Sometimes I wonder if the words "socialist, communist, liberal", derived and some others shouldn't be prohibited in the USA. Most people haven't any idea of their meaning.
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:4, Informative)
I prove my case. Among The 25 Points of Hitler's Nazi Party [historyplace.com] were:
- 11. That all unearned income, and all income that does not arise from work, be abolished.
- 13. We demand the nationalization of all trusts.
- 14. We demand profit-sharing in large industries.
- 15. We demand a generous increase in old-age pensions.
- 18. We demand that ruthless war be waged against those who work to the injury of the common welfare. Traitors, usurers, profiteers, etc., are to be punished with death, regardless of creed or race.
When Hitler had his power he abolished unemployment in half year. Is that socialist enough.Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:3, Funny)
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:3, Funny)
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:4, Insightful)
<p>
It gained power by:
<ol>
<li>frightening majority of it's people by telling them that nation was constantly threathened from inside and outside,
<li>convincing that majority that they as a nation had special place and destiny in the world,
<li>ridiculing opposite viewpoints and making them look unpatriotic.
</ol>
Nowdays people look out and despise flags with svastika and naziuniforms. Modern version of evil may gain it's power looking wery different but using the same method.
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:5, Insightful)
You are all socialists in that regard. The question is a matter of a degree, and who gets "serviced" by these government institutions. The government is really a whole network of institutions, and just who those institutions work for is often up for grabs. Many conservatives are quite happy to evoke the idea of "laissez-faire" after they hide or ignore the ways in which the interests of the powerful are being buttressed by the state. When the state provides any services to the not-powerful, though, it gets tarnished as "socialism."
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:3)
Socialism is economics (Score:5, Informative)
Also, don't be an idiot and say Nazi's were socialist because they called themselves socialist. Do you beleive everything the Nazi's tell you?
Kind Regards
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:4, Informative)
Yeah. So? Do you think the Democrats and Republicans are arguing over whether we should have direct or representative government? National Socialism was a name not a description. Hitler wasn't a socialist by any reasonable definition.
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:4, Informative)
Have you even read Marx? Communism is an economic system in which the people themselves collectively own the means of production; communism is *NOT* the strict authoritarian regimes you've come to know and hate. Fascistic socialism is Fascism. Communal ownership of factories and fields is Communism. I have no-the-fuck idea where you pulled *your* definition of communism from, but it sure wasn't from Marx, nor any valid political scientist.
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:3, Insightful)
Oooh, ooh, ooh! I think I know! I think his definition of Communisim is based on every single instance of communist government that exist or ever existed. Yeah, that's probably were he got that. Not based on a book that was written by some quack who didn't understand human nature, and who wouldn't have been able to live under his own system anyway, if he weren't the one in control.
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:4, Insightful)
It's like saying the the crime rate would fall if everyone would just quit robbing, raping, and killing each other. Just because the statement is true, that doesn't make it useful. The "true communism has never been tried" argument is equally fatuous.
Education (Score:4, Insightful)
I have noticed this in several cases, where depending on where you grow up, and when, primary education teaches different versions of 'facts'.
Sad really, how the education system pushes their twisted agenda, quietly, over generations...
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:2)
Socialist? How are RIAA, MPAA or any branch of your government "socialist"?
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:2)
How are RIAA, MPAA or any other branch of your government "socialist"?
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:2)
Are they *supporters* of free market principles?
They are fucking socialists.
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm old enough to remember when the Republicans wanted to "get government out of our lives."
i.e. before they had all the power in government.
Re:I Guess The Children Did Work (Score:5, Insightful)
Too true. How many bills had Bush vetoed?
I'm old enough to remember when the Republicans wanted to "get government out of our lives."
Yeah, they certainly enjoyed the Libertarian line until it came to their term in power.
Do you remember Reagan's acceptance speech?
"...Government *is* the problem"
How soon they forget.
Comment removed (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Abuse of power (Score:3, Insightful)
No, that's a Crusade.
Unless, off course, you approve of the Oklahoma City bombing (which, btw, was immediatly and erroneously blamed on islamists when it happened). Or the anthrax mailings (internal, and using the strain the U.S. military owns).
Turn the other cheek. (Score:3, Insightful)
Your logic is as good as your spelling.
Re:WTF? (Score:3, Insightful)
Whatever you think about socialism, in this case (and the cases of Hitler and Stalin) the problem isn't so much socialism as it is extremism.
Moderation in all things.
Re:Yeah, well... (Score:5, Insightful)
But of course the RIAA is a terrorist group! (Score:5, Funny)
Prohibition (Score:2)
And prohibition of trading in alcoholic beverages during the 1920s boosted the power of organized crime.
Re:lmfao That is... (Score:2)
Re:I was going to post something insightful (Score:3, Insightful)
But you're right, that's a fucking joke
Re:Pass it on (Score:3, Interesting)
Reading Boing Boing this morning, I was flabbergasted as I read the comments of Marybeth Peters, the United States Register of Copyrights. The circular logic and specious reasoning she employed made me question if she has the intelligence required to hold such a position. She raises the ugly specter of terrorism when she says, "although the information is sketchy at best, there have been a series of rumored ties between pirating operations and terrorist organizations." This supposed link is used to